The Big Fat First Trimester Post

I’m going to be honest here:  I had planned out a bunch of posts to talk about my first trimester, chat about workouts and food, give you “remedies” for morning sickness (which, sadly, I found none) and talk about how my husband has been so incredibly supportive and loving this whole time we’ve been pregnant.  But every time I sat down to write though the words would just not come!  And so, in the interest of catching y’all fully up to where we are today, here are my (lengthy) bullet points on all subjects first trimester til now (19 weeks!):

First Trimester – Food

• When we first saw the two little lines on the home pregnancy test I was a crazy mix of emotions.  Nate hugged me and smiled and said he was so happy.  I bawled like a baby with a mixture of excitement, fear, anxiety, and generally just freaking out.  Then we laid on the bed and held each other with a teddy bear that one of our friends got us after our miscarriage.  If I’m being honest I was scared for many reasons, but a couple of moments in there were because I was afraid of losing the memory of our first baby.  But I am always reminded, even when I just want to sit and wallow in sadness and fear, that God has not given us a spirit of fear (2 Timothy 1:7).  He has given me life that I don’t deserve, and with the first baby that we lost he gave me the ability to love in ways that I never knew before.  My fear is now replaced by love and the knowledge that I am free in Christ.
• As with the first pregnancy I smugly reveled in the fact that at a mere 5 weeks pregnant I was not sick.  I ate salads, legumes, lean meats and tons of fruits and veggies.  Smoothies were a mainstay and I worked out for 90 minutes every day.  I was invincible…and then I got morning sickness.  Which leads me to the next point…
• Morning sickness sucks.  I briefly hit on it earlier this week, but the only thing that slightly “helped” was the fact that I was force-feeding myself every 1-2 hours.  The only thing that sounded good were burritos or pizza, but not too spicy.  Gum became my worst enemy.  I’ve never really cared if there was ice in my water, but goshdarnit if my water wasn’t frigidly ice-cold at all times I would get sick to my stomach.  I had a metallic-sweet taste in my mouth whenever I wasn’t eating, which was awful.  The times I felt best were actually right after I got sick…then I could eat anything!  Around 13 weeks it started to wane and at 14 weeks I was eating foods that I hadn’t had in about 6 weeks and felt amazing.  Except for gum – it’s still just not doing it for me.
• As for cooking?  I look back and I still don’t know how I kept blogging.  I made a lot of muffins (which were actually good and I love) and sweet baked things.  I just couldn’t stomach the smells of cooking for about 2 weeks, which meant we ate out almost every night.  Don’t get me wrong, I love to eat out, but after a while everything starts to taste the same.  Except burritos and pizza obviously.

First Trimester – Workouts & Life

• When I first found out I was pregnant I was walking and/or trail running with our dogs for about an hour every morning and doing about 30 minutes of weight training and/or yoga at night.  I started sticking to walking only after finding out I was pregnant, mainly because I would not have considered running a workout that my body was “used to” doing beforehand (I had just started to pick up a running regimen again) and I didn’t feel comfortable continuing to do it.  Once the sickness hit, however, I was lucky to get a 20-minute walk in in the morning or at night and the rest of the time I was just trying to find the energy to stay awake and not throw up.
• Now that I’ve started to feel better I’ve been walking for 45 minutes about 3-4 times a week but have yet to find time to get in a great strength-training and flexibility routine again.  That being said, I truly miss working out so my plan this weekend is to organize my life so that I build the time into my schedule to introduce strength and flexibility work back into my routine.  Nate got me a great prenatal workout DVD for my birthday that I still need to incorporate, but it makes me happy to have something that will take into account my “condition” as a way to re-introduce workouts to my life.
• Did I mention I miss working out?
• When we first found out we decided that we really didn’t want to share the information with anyone other than our parents/siblings and very few close friends.  We did tell our bosses because we knew they needed to be in on us missing work for doctors’ appointments.  The reason?  I just didn’t feel comfortable sharing just yet.  If we had miscarried we would have still told people and I would have announced it on here – I don’t think it’s a good thing to live in isolation.  But at the same time I just did not feel OK telling people yet.  I didn’t want a bunch of emails or texts asking how I was doing or how I was holding up or how I was dealing with being pregnant after miscarrying.  As soon as the 13-week appointment hit we had a little get-together to announce to friends that we were pregnant and started preparing our hearts to share with more people.  I wouldn’t change how we did it at all…a lot of times when you’re pregnant you hear people telling you to do/not do things if they do/don’t feel right, and I believe that was the best way for us to approach the announcement!
• I was nervous to tell all of y’all 🙂
• As for weight, I don’t care about the number of pounds on the scale that I weigh; in fact, I’ve told my doctor I don’t want to know the number.  I DO, however, care about not gaining too much weight since diabetes is something that Nate and I both have on both sides of our family.  Now I know that weight gain alone isn’t a determining factor in gestational diabetes, but I am taking precautions to not get to a point where that could be something that happens.  That means eating well (with the occasional ice cream & cake), being active/working towards being more active, and being sure to not gain more than my doctor has suggested (which is around 25 lbs or so).

First Trimester – Clothes

• I’ve never claimed to be a clothes horse or that I have a highly developed sense of fashion, although I do believe that I know what looks good when I see it.  In fact most days you can find me in shorts or jeans and a T-shirt and probably with a hoody over it…it’s kind of my uniform.  In the days of morning/all day sickness I rocked this outfit like none other.
• Now that I’m starting to get a little bigger I am starting to realize that my usual uniform is not that flattering for pregnant women.  Which means that I am actually going to have to start dressing like a grown-up.  This is big-time scary for me.
• I have yet to go shopping for maternity jeans, but since I realized that my favorite pair of non-maternity pants (that still fit when they’re buttoned up) are, well, dead.
• For my birthday my parents got me some adorable maternity tops, a couple of belly bands (BeBand) and a maternity tank that I have been wearing nonstop.  I may never go back to normal clothes again.
• Other than that I’ve been shopping around, thinking about dresses and leggings and jeans and tops, and waiting to see how big I can get before actually having to spend money on stuff.  Turns out having a baby is slightly pricey, so I’m holding off on spending money til it’s completely necessary!

Weeks 14-19 – Second Trimester

• I didn’t think it was possible but I’ve become more emotional as time has gone on, crying at the silliest things or even nothing at all.  I know you’re thinking it too:  poor Nate.
• I’ve been singing “Amazing Grace” to our baby every day, even before it could hear.  Now that it’s developing its sense of hearing I’m hoping to continue this.  My mom used to sing it to me every night before going to sleep and I absolutely adore the words and meaning of the song.
• I talk to the baby and feel kind of silly doing it.  I guess I just don’t know what to say?  So I’ll wax poetic about anything random that I’m thinking and just hope that it just likes to hear my voice 🙂
• I don’t know if I can feel it moving or not and most of the time think it might just be gas, but I lay on the couch with my hands on my belly and just try to breathe quietly.  There have been some weird feelings that I know can’t be gas, but I’m hoping for some kicks soon.
• Oops, there I go again – started crying because I started thinking about feeling the baby kick.  Told you – emotional!

Since I believe this post is long enough and covers quite a bit I’m going to stop there.  I can’t believe that we’re going to be halfway through this pregnancy next week!  Not only that, but we will hopefully know if we’re having a boy or girl next week too!  We’re starting to think about the actual act of having a child, I’m panicking about the pain and giving myself pep talks already.  If you have any questions at all please feel free to ask…I will always try to answer as best as I can!

Much love,

Heather